Chelmsford champion Lorestas Trumpauskas had to be content with the runners-up spot in the mens singles at the Essex Closed tournament at the BATTS club in Harlow over the Easter weekend.

He lost a thrilling three game final 22-20 in the third to Dagenham's ever-improving Clive Carthy - 18,13,20.

Spectators were treated to some lightning hitting with Carthy holding his nerve after Trumpauskas pulled back a 15-20 deficit in the third game.

Dave Cole also made Carthy work hard in his semi-final only succumbing - 19,17,12.

Lorestas was able to console himself with a share in the mens doubles title as he and Writtle team-mate Paul Lucas got the better of Dave Cole and Dave Window 14,10 in the final.

Chelmsford league players made up a large portion of the entry to this event and Dave Window, Paul Lucas and Steve Kerns all made it through to the men's singles quarter-finals with Terry Guymer going down to Trumpauskas at the semi-final stage.

Arguably the most successful player of the weekend was Maldon's irrepressible Marilyn Bawden who took the ladies singles title and the ladies veterans singles as well as the mixed doubles and veterans mixed doubles.

Her opponent in both singles final was Basildon's Jenny Harrison and she share her mixed doubles successes with Danbury's Terry Guymer on both occasions.

Danbury's up-and-coming Ben Warner put behind his defeat in the junior boys final to Romford's Zayd Mauthoor on the Saturday with a superb 18-in-the-third victory in the U21 mens semi-final over Paul Lucas.

Warner totally outplayed Ilford's Robin Glassberg 21-9, 21-5 in the final as the scores illustrate.

To complete a busy weekend, Ben also took the junior boys doubles title with promising ECC regular Neil Disley and the junior mixed doubles title with another ECC player Kay Barham (Southend).

With shocks abounding all round, Ben paired with ECC's Hannah Cook, fought their way through to the senior mixed doubles final against all the odds before falling to the Guymer/Bawden partnership.

Former Maldon player Ray Murray continues to haunt his younger rivals and he secured the shock of the tournament by beating the third-seed in the mens singles Gary Tendler (Ilford).

Murray went on to take the O40s title with outstanding wins over Terry Guymer and Trevor Campbell (Ilford).

He duly added the Over 50s title by beating Writtle's Ev Lucas in the final and was heard joking that he was disappointed that there was no Over 60s event!

Writtle first-team captain Ev Lucas was another player who had a busy Sunday as he also reached the restricted mens singles final with fine victories over Colchester's Andrew Holmes and Dagenham's Ron Turner before losing to Ray Lam (Ilford).

Matthew Staines, 13, of Braintree, who turns out for ECC in the Chelmsford League, played superbly to take the U14s title on the Saturday getting the better of the equally talented Umair Mauthoor (Ilford), the more experienced Matthew Weil (Peniel) and then county no. 1, Lee Daines in the final.

Staines paired up with Daines to take the U14 boys doubles title and they also made it through to the U17 boys doubles title before losing to Ben Warner and Neil Disley.

The future looks promising for the likes of Staines, Daines and Disley.

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.